


What Dreams May Come

by Sea-Glass (PJ_Marvell)



Category: Rusty Quill Gaming (Podcast)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-31
Updated: 2019-03-31
Packaged: 2019-12-27 02:12:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,831
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18294755
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PJ_Marvell/pseuds/Sea-Glass
Summary: Unattended, the Machine's stacks dream. Images flicker of children's faces, of dogs with red balls and cold running water under hot mountain sunlight. Corridors twist impossibly and familiar places are at once known and alien.  And, somewhere, a wistful memory of eel pie.





	What Dreams May Come

**Author's Note:**

  * For [roswyrm](https://archiveofourown.org/users/roswyrm/gifts).



In the half-light and the quiet, in the secret shadow under Paris, the Machine dreams.

There's the rushing noise of hydraulics and the crackle of lightning - a calculation is being made. The Machine sends messages flying across the aether, from taxi to bank to automaton along the wired nerves of its enormous consciousness, keeping the city of Paris ticking around like a great intricate clockface. In those moments, there is only the great _I_ of the Machine. Each component (which is how the Machine thinks of the parts that make it) united by wiring and impulse, pulls together to compute or store or predict or change, and once the rumbling and flickering dies down, the Machine allows itself the warm glow of a job well done. It has even installed a little gentle orange bulb in its console for warm-glowing-purposes.

It does not think of what the components do when It is not using them, in much the same way a person would not wonder of the inner life of their hand as it lies at rest by their side. They are the Machine now - what could they do?

The answer, of course, is what every mortal mind does in the darkness and the silence.

Unattended, the Machine's stacks dream. Images flicker of children's faces, of dogs with red balls and cold running water under hot mountain sunlight. Corridors twist impossibly and familiar places are at once known and alien. There is the glint of a knife, of cruel laughter and then a longer, terminal darkness.

And, somewhere, a wistful memory of eel pie. It tasted better when it was stolen, although it's difficult to tell now if that flavour came from the purloining of the pastry, or the company it was eaten in, atop a roof in Other London while cheating at cards.

_“You got that ace from up your sleeve,” said Sasha, swiping at the stack of coppers he’d accumulated._

_“Fuck off, I won that fair and square!” Brock held her off - she was fast, but for all her growth spurts he still had a foot of height on her, and therefore a superiority of arms. In this specific instance, a superiority of arm length._

_Sasha tried to twist out of his grip, get her fingers to his coins or her knuckles to his face, but she was just a fraction too far away for either. As Brock palmed the coins in his stash, Sasha gave up and sat back, glaring at him. Brock grinned, although he knew his cousin well enough to know not to relax._

_“I know you got that ace from up your sleeve, because I didn’t deal it to you.” She sniffed, sweeping the cards back into the pile and shuffling._

_“Here, you give me those!” Brock leaned forward, feigned outrage on his face. “I’m not having you deal me a shit hand again.”_

_“No!” she darted back, twisting out of his reach. “I might deal the cards where I want them to go, but I don’t add cards to the pack.”_

_“What’s the difference?” Brock asked, trying not to laugh at her affronted expression._

_“It means_ you’re _worse! At least I work with what I’ve got.”_

_“Yeah, along with what everyone else has got,” he snorted._

_“Point_ is _,” said Sasha, dealing the next hand. “I don’t keep aces up my sleeves. I’m better than that.”_

_“Are you really, shortarse?” Brock looked at his cards. It was the worst hand he’d had in weeks. She really was good, not that he was going to tell her that. “We’ll see.”_

_Sasha stuck her tongue out at him, before fishing a chunk of eel pie out of her pocket and chewing it, while her eyes went to her cards and her expression turned intent._

_They were halfway through the hand before Brock realised that Sasha had finished her eel pie ages ago and that his pocket was, now he thought about it, quite a lot lighter than it should be._

_“Oi!” he yelled, starting forward to grab her, but she was far too fast, scattering the cards over the tiles as she darted behind a chimney stack. He gave chase, of course, torn between yelling and laughing as she sprinted across the rooftops, stopping occasionally to stuff more of his eel pie in her mouth, making sure he could see._

_He doesn’t remember now if he caught her or not. The outcome wasn’t the important part, really - it was the feeling of the chase, sprinting after or away from or beside Sasha, jumping across the chimneyed canopy of Other London in the few moments of freedom afforded them. It wasn’t anywhere close to paradise, not even then, for all the distance of the years made the memory of it shimmer like jewels._

Somewhere, an image of the rooftops of Other London is stored in the Machine's memory banks. It's not accurate, but how is the Machine to know no golden a light ever shone on the undercity?

*  
The Machine both knows everything, and nothing.

_It’s an interesting paradox_ , it muses with some spare processing capacity. Data from all of its mechanisms across Paris and beyond is flooding into its components at all times, but there is only so much time it has to spare to analysing it. Most of it is dross, the command inputs from the taxis and servant automatons, passengers coming and going from the stations, the millions and millions of rows of data generated by a world growing busier and more interconnected every week. So while it can contain the minutiae of every life of everyone who has ever interacted with its systems, to actually examine and analyse this data, to actually _know_ this information, is a task of another order of magnitude. And really, what would be the point? The Machine keeps things running without a deep and personal examination of this data, and any really concerning people bring themselves to its attention, usually. Perhaps it will take a day, one day, to examine each datum it gathers as it is gathered, just to see what it could discover. But not now. There is work to be done.

Money in enormous amounts flies through the aether, guided by the Machine, which is also considering humming in contentment at it does so. It’s not sure it has appropriately tuneful vocal equipment - it makes a note to consider designing some later.

Somewhere, in the vast columns of components, one point of data sticks. It’s entirely lacking in significance, a scrap that means nothing to the Machine, but in this component, the Thought happens.

_Sasha Rackett is coming to Paris._

There might be fear attached to this thought; it’s difficult to tell without an adrenal gland. It is negative, though - this is bad.

It’s also not a thought that belongs to the Machine. For another reason the component can’t place, although it can recognise the urgency of it, it’s vital that the Thought stays here, in this particular component.

_Sasha Rackett_ is coming to Paris.

That’s bad because it’s dangerous here, the component realises. Bad things happen in the shadows in the city, things of knives and pain. And it’s very important that these things don’t happen to Sasha. The component is not sure why, but it is sure.

_Keep Sasha Rackett safe_ , thinks the component. Then, _how, exactly?_

The component tries reaching out, feeling through the aberrant neurons of the Machine for a way to alter things. It finds it, all right - it's suddenly plugged into some sort of data feed from the city's automatons and everything is, for the moment, lost.

It comes back to itself a while later, regrouping around the Thought. Getting back its state of singularity feels a bit like putting a jigsaw puzzle back together. In a river, while swimming against the current. It has the distinct impression it has a headache, although that seems really quite unfair, considering it doesn't have a head anymore.

_But I did used to have one_ , it remembers. _Interesting._

It tries a few more times, reaching out for sense or control and each time the overwhelming mind of the Machine subsumes it and it is lost among the electric currents again. It’s like trying to sip from a firehose - there is so much traffic on the pathways of the Machine’s thoughts that it can’t help but get swept away even as it keeps to the very edges.

It's going about this wrong. You don't just walk up to something you want and take it - that's the best way to end up in a cell somewhere. Granted, in the current situation, there are unlikely to be guards, cells and pockets, but the principle is the same. He needs to wait until the Machine is looking elsewhere, and see what he can find on the fringes and...repurpose.

_“Look,” whispered Brock. “The principle was sound.”_

_“Shut up!” snapped Sasha soundlessly._

_The noise of pursuit rattled above their heads. Someone barks “These little shits think they're clever - look everywhere! Check the rafters!”_

Good idea, _thought Brock delightedly from beneath the floorboards,_ but in the wrong direction.

_They lay noiselessly beneath the knotholed planks as boots that itched to give them both a kicking tramped overhead._

_“They're not here!” shouted the same gruff voice. “They must have got out over the roof!”_

_Brock didn't giggle as they stomped away; giggling would have been suicide. Didn't mean he wasn't bloody tempted._

_They lay very quiet for a long time afterwards. The Meathooks weren't known for their intellectual capabilities but Brock wasn't planning on getting nabbed just because they’d had their annual stroke of intelligence and left a scout behind in case they did exactly what they were doing._

_“So,” said Sasha, voice barely louder than the creaks of the settling building. “Run that plan by me again.”_

_“We nick the Meathooks’ poker pot. I set off a squib outside their window, we wait on the window ledge until they all run out to see what the bang was. Then we stroll in, nick their cash, and wander off out the back door before they've even noticed.”_

_“Only they didn't all run out. No-Nickname Vinny and his mates stayed at the card table.”_

_Brock rolled his eyes. He didn’t think she could see it - there were too many joists between him and Sasha for them to properly see each others’ faces and he was wedged too tightly to change to a position where they could. But he attempted to radiate an aura of affronted genius nonetheless._

_“Yeah, well, there's something wrong with Vinny then. The plan should have worked.” It should have. It was a classic. You make a distraction - people follow the distraction - you get to steal what they’re not looking at. It was perfect in its simplicity._

_Brock huffed silently; a moment later the quality of the silence changed, became the silence of someone having an idea. His eyes didn't twinkle with the prospect of fresh adventure - there wasn't enough light._

_“Hey, Sasha, you know where we can pinch a wedding cake from? I’ve got a plan…”_

Somewhere, the satisfied not-hum of the Machine falters. Some of the money transfers sent today have gone astray, lost or repeated. It's not difficult to troubleshoot - a quick concerted effort tracks down and reroutes every wayward data packet. It's nothing much, just some small international bank transfers, business as usual for individual banking. It's puzzling, though - the Machine thought it had ironed out all the bugs in its processes months ago. _Ah well_ , it thinks. _I shall have to run another debugging._

As the Machine (humming again) aligns components and resources for the spring-cleaning project, all traces of a very large payment to a hotel on the Champs-Élysées are quietly erased.

*  
The Machine is interested. Someone came to visit François Henri today. The Machine doesn’t know why. She didn’t like it when she spoke to François Henri; the Machine felt a pang of sympathy with that - it misses François Henri. But the Machine is François Henri’s little secret, and so the Machine made sure she wouldn’t remember. It’s all right - it put a really nice memory of tea and chatter there - the sort of conversation the Machine had with him, or would have had if it drank tea. It hasn’t had a conversation like that in such a long time - it misses François Henri.

The Machine supposes this is melancholy. It feels slow and wistful, the usual satisfaction in successfully completing its functions dulled and faded. It’s not a feeling the Machine likes, but the data it has gathered suggests there is not much to be done about it, save carrying on and occupying one’s mind with other things. Then again, the Machine has _so much_ mind, fully occupying it might be difficult. It will simply have to live with being mournful. At least Sasha is here. He’s glad Sasha’s here, he missed her very much.

The Machine pauses. It doesn’t know Sasha. It’s sure it has never seen that pale girl before. How could it miss her?

It traces back down the enormous necromantic structures that constitute its neural pathways and cannot find a source for the thought. _That is very odd_ , it thinks. _Perhaps I am in more need of debugging than I realised._

At no point does it examine one individual, unregarded component, thinking furiously.

_That was altogether too close._ He would breathe a sigh of relief, if he still had lungs, that he’s once again reeled in his thoughts to his own mind. The joy of seeing Sasha there - older, sadder, and that was definitely a new scar on her cheek - had overwhelmed him to the point where the feeling had escaped, registered as a thought in the metamind of the Machine. Attention seems to have passed away from him, for now, although he doubts he’ll be as lucky again.

It's exhausting, this dance of staying hidden. There's so much to do, so much to accomplish trying to keep Sasha safe, and he can't do any of it openly. He has to be constantly on the lookout for an opportunity, for moments when the Machine is occupied, or for avenues into backwater parts of its mind it doesn’t often inspect. When he’s there, when he’s got control enough to change things, it’s then an effort of pure will to keep the movements secret and undiscovered and (hardest of all) in his own brain only.

It's exhausting, but also exhilarating, like the moment of fingers slipping into a pocket or the moment of flying after a wild leap, in the split second before before gravity remembers it should be pulling you down.

_“Everyone has a blind spot,” said Seven-Fingers Charlie, shuffling the cards deftly for all he had a only a finger and a thumb on his right hand. “And do you two know where it is?”_

_“Behind them?” said Brock, seven years old and wide-eyed, entirely entranced by the crooked grin on Charlie's seamed face. He glanced back down at his hands, holding the ace of diamonds between them. Charlie had told him to hold tight to it and Brock had seen enough card tricks to know what would happen if the person dealing told you that._

_“No, it's just in front of you,” piped Sasha from beside him. “ Jimmy showed me, if you move your finger like this…”_

_Brock watched her as she went almost boss-eyed trying to recreate the trick._

_“Both wrong!” cackled Charlie, and when Brock looked back Charlie was holding the ace of diamonds. In Brock's hand was now the eight of clubs._

_“The blind spot, sprogs,” said Charlie, shuffling both cards back into the pack. “Is exactly where you make it.”_

How is sleight of hand without a body possible? He's not sure, but he's managed it so far. He's kept himself contained and unrevealed and, therefore, Sasha has been safe.

She won't be safe forever though - the Machine knows her name now. He's going to have to work harder, push his boundaries further. It will be almost impossible and he won’t be able to stay hidden indefinitely, but he doesn’t need to. He needs to hold on just a little longer. Just a little while longer.

_I can’t do this forever, but maybe I can do it for just long enough,_ he thinks.

Then, _I know who’s doing the thinking. Me._

The vastness of the Machine is still there, still all-knowing and soul-shakingly huge, and staying him is like walking a tightrope above an abyss, if an abyss could reach up and threaten to pull you down into it. It takes such concentration to remember to be separate, not to be consumed by the million eyes and trillion memories of this abomination he’s bound to.

But he knows now that he is himself, that he is his own and that feels like victory.

Somewhere, in the desecrated twilight, in the heart of Paris’ hidden horror, Brock Rackett isn't dreaming any more.


End file.
